Pretty nice deal for both sides. I love it when both parties act with some respect and honor. Texans willing to reward him well and Foster not obsessing about being the highest paid in the league. I'm sure being an UDFA, a check for $15 million looks awfully nice.

So let's say you're Arian Foster & you (& your agent) think you are worth as much as Adrian Peterson, DMC, etc...

The thing to do is play this contract through the first three years, collecting $10M/yr (30M over the first 3 years), then ask for a new deal after the 3rd year.

That's basically what Andre did, & if Arian proves to be our best player over the next 3 years, it's going to be hard to say no..... it's also going to be hard to say yes to a RB with 6 years on the odometer.

D. Williams got a 16 M signing bonus so lets base Fosters off this....we will round his to an even 15 to make it more simple math

his bonus would be UP FRONT, thats why it is reported he gets 18 MILLION this SEASON, but for cap purposes it is prorated over the life of the contract, meaning for 5 seasons 3 M will count against our cap (unless we cut or trade him prior to his contract expiring)

Now he is guaranteed 20.75 and it is payed in the first 3 seasons, we will assume he took the LEAST amount this season to help our team and salary cap plus he gets a massive cash bonus. That means the AVERAGE IS 6.92 M, but you cannot increase a salary more than 30% each season, SO I will take away 30% in year one, give him the average (6.92) in year 2 and increase that 30% in year 3

Then you would take the first 3 years of 20.75 and subtract it from the total contract 43.5 and would have 22.75 left for the last 2 seasons

I think we will be pleasantly surprised by the end of free agency going into the draft. I still expect some players to be cut in favor of draft choices, and better producing yet cheap free agents. Jacoby Jones I am looking straight at you my friend...

Pretty nice deal for both sides. I love it when both parties act with some respect and honor. Texans willing to reward him well and Foster not obsessing about being the highest paid in the league. I'm sure being an UDFA, a check for $15 million looks awfully nice.

The Robinson situation blew up because Dunta felt insulted by Rick Smith and claims he was told to his face that he wasn't the kind of corner anyone would pay big money to or franchise tag. Smith was clearly 100% wrong on both counts as he franchised D-Rob and ATL gave him his big contract.

I don't see Smith insulting Mario when he is the consensus best free agent on the market and everyone knows he's going to break the bank.

__________________
“Every man takes the limits of his own field of vision for the limits of the world.” -Arthur Schopenhauer

So let's say you're Arian Foster & you (& your agent) think you are worth as much as Adrian Peterson, DMC, etc...

The thing to do is play this contract through the first three years, collecting $10M/yr (30M over the first 3 years), then ask for a new deal after the 3rd year.

That's basically what Andre did, & if Arian proves to be our best player over the next 3 years, it's going to be hard to say no..... it's also going to be hard to say yes to a RB with 6 years on the odometer.

I'll take the 3 years and run with it.

If he pulls and AJ and IF he's worth it after the initial 3 years, that's a bridge i cross when I get there. But three years, now, is a good starting point.

Good analysis, btw, of bringing up the possibility of Arian doing what AJ did. Get the money up-front, now, and then come back for a new deal 3 yrs down the road if things are going swimmingly.

I am waiting on that news. I just value building from the trenches and when you get good pieces you got to lock those up...... and that doesn't even mention Duane Brown needing to be extended just around the corner.

Well losing Mario makes all that possible, unfortunately, I don't want to see him go but it does solve a lot of problems financially.

__________________Warning: This post may or may not contain sarcasm, satire, or humor in general. Read at your own risk!

This is great news. But from this signing I think that still puts Mario as our top priority. Foster got a 5 year $43.5M contract with $20.75M guaranteed. He makes $18M in his 1st season and $30M total in the first 3 seasons. Relax. His cap number is likely not $18M for 2012. The $18M is likely mostly signing bonus which is prorates over the 5 year contract. I'm thinking something like $15M SB + $3M base for 2012. So his cap hit might be around $6M.

This is good news for Mario (and Myers). We have 17 FA salaries coming off the books on March 13th (only 12 roster spots because 5 salaries were added as IR replacements). One of those salaries is Mario's $18 million. One of those is Chris Myer's salary. He had a 4 year $11 million contract. With Foster only accounting for $6M of that in 2012, we can give $10M of it to Mario and the remaining $2M we can add to whatever Myers has coming off the books from last year. See we just took care of our top 3 priorities with Mario Williams' salary from 2011. The rest of our FA's will not cost nearly as much (and we have 15 salaries to account for 9 other roster spots). Keep in mind we are going to draft some rookies to fill some roster spots. Oh yeah and we have three $1.5 contract exceptions (contracts that won't count against the salary cap). So we have 15 salaries to cover 6 roster spots. Oh yeah and we have three $1.5 contract exception (contracts that won't count against the salary cap). So we have 15 salaries to cover 6 roster spots.

So I expect for us to go hard in negotiations over the next week and try to nab those 2 before FA begins March 13th.